A process for getting through a day...

“At least it’s Friday,” a teacher once said to me, “Anyone can get through a Friday.”

What this meant to me? Soon we will have no responsibility for anyone but ourselves, soon we will not have to answer to student, parent, administration or peer. And…bonus!…we don’t have to rise on Saturday morning to return to this environment.

I, a parent of many, responded with a polite smile. You don’t know my world.

In my world back then, Friday meant the beginning of a weekend of compromises– child and teenager needs vs. family and parent needs. These negotiations had a huge impact on the quality of my life in the moment and on the quality of my relationships over time. Many adults advised: Let them do what they want or Just say NO! I did not listen to the adults. I listened to the young adults and children. I offered compromises.

I asked myself:

  • What do we lose when we decide we will not listen? We will not compromise?

  • What is the quality of our relationships when we decide we are giving up?

  • or decide we’re going to say NO, over and over, until the requests stop coming?

“My indigestion is caused by the process, not the outcome, by the limited perspective, not the outcome. ”
— me, today

I woke to news today of a teacher’s strike ended by government order, not negotiation. My stomach has been a-jumble with the first sip of coffee.

I’m not surprised at the impasse, at the breakdown of negotiations. I’m not surprised at the decision by the government to avoid arbitration by invoking the notwithstanding clause– essentially a veto power given to provinces in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, to be used in extreme cases. Renegotiating contracts with government employees (teachers) is not an extreme anything; it is a responsibility and a duty. Employees of the government are employees of the people. The government is employed by the people. The people have been patient with the government and the teachers, letting the process happen.

Will the people remain patient? How will the people respond? How will we get through this day??

The majority of our elected government officials and the premier of our province, Danielle Smith, has decided they can’t get through a Monday or any other day of the week or weekend without turning towards measures of authoritarianism.

In our province’s family, it appears Danielle Smith is either a Queen of Hearts from Alice’s nightmare– Off With Their Heads!– or a woman with her heart governed the powerful around her– Let’s see what will happen if we go beyond our power…if you take a hit, we have your back…

What havoc do we invite into our lives with the unwillingness to listen, to compromise?

“Whatever you hold, hold it lightly. Allow what is held to breathe, to communicate, to change and evolve.”
— me, today

Blue whale…songs/communication can be heard thousands of miles away…

Today I meditated with the sounds of a blue whale’s communication- a deep resonant hum, sometimes a fluttering sound (highly recommended strategy in a stressful situation).

As I listened and truly attended to the physical vibration in my ears and in my whole body, calm rose, concern lessened:

  • The stomach indigestion: a holding on and a letting go feeling (literally!) evened out.

  • The story of good vs. evil, of right vs. wrong, of fight vs. faint or flee began to fade.

  • This is the reality sunk in: we are in a cycle of push and pull, of force opposing force.

  • A sense of deep care emerged in the chest area.

  • Clarity arrived.

How to get through a day: A process.

  1. Await what wants to be revealed.

  2. Allow the information: bad news, good news, stomach ache, conflicting opinions/beliefs: don’t turn away.

  3. Accept reality: listen and hear and understand both sides of anything.

  4. Attend to the desire for balance. Take action from the place of deep care.

My attending action: I felt the conflict. I felt through the conflict. I talked to two teachers, one retired and one in the middle of everything. I heard their despair, their anger, their frustration, and their belief in the role of public education in a compassionate and wise society. I watched the process from the government’s late night session (a process which limited debate to only one hour). I sent letters from my heart. Letters of understanding the difficulty of negotiations at a time when it appears the easiest and best course of action is to act from a position of authority. Letters of understanding the importance of considering not just one year or four years into the future but decades, generations. I sent letters I believed communicated a deep level of care, for all concerned. I wrote this blog post. I am open to hearing any other action I might take to assist in bringing balance, equanimity, sanity to the reality I am living with…

Already I hear the voices of doubt and derision from both sides of the argument. This response is not strong enough. They will run right over you/us. We are doomed. We have no better options.

How do we calm the escalation of aggression? One human. Another human. Another human. Another human. All of us humans listening to blue whale communication, remembering our humanity. Re-membering our humanity.

The process for getting through a day may need to be shared far and wide. Thank you for reading.

“Balance. Balance. Balance. Balance.”
— me, today

Quiet Noticing. October 22, 2025

After the night of the new moon…

stars aglow. inner and outer reflect- the night of the new moon, a time of new beginnings.

I've been working with Zuza Engler each Wednesday to move and attend to the body in the presence of a small group over zoom. Here is my documentation of the body between sessions with Zuza.

The I notice process: move around for awhile in the morning and then, pause, reflect. Start a fresh page in the journal with I notice.  

Notice body, external environment, allow sensation, notice sensation. 

Let the rough draft be the only draft. No need to repair or decorate. Stick with what arises. Trust what arises. 

Here is today's documentation: 

I notice an ache in each of my hips.

A slight tension in the low back. In the jaw.

Now, a pressure in the forehead

I notice the ash and spruce hear 

a quiet music this morning- they do not

flutter or sway, groove or groan

in the wind.

I notice a sadness wants to emerge and

I reach for a familiar narrative 

but it swims

away...

...this sadness is like water, 

not wind.

I've been drinking it 

for lifetimes...

...as if my cells hold 

my mother's despair and 

my father's too...

and theirs held their parents...

...passed down...

...passed through...

here, now...

...sadness of separation from 

the mother.

I notice in my low belly

a sleeping dragon stirs.

She holds a pearl.

Dance, she says.

Dance, and this pearl will become

your disco ball.

I shift my attention.

The early light of sunrise

shades the mountains pink,

pink light frosts 

the underside of 

clouds...

...forming messages

I may read as 

love. 

I know a bearded dragon named Lola, she often speaks in my writing.

disco ball of light reflected, inner and outer merge?

so much beauty. so much.

Dispatch from April 9, 2025. Evidence of audio memo to text.

Dispatch from the field. Waxing Gibbous moon at 95%

Recorded last night:

A memoir can be written in a moment, in a moment so full of the record, the events you’ve lived that it requires verbs and nouns arranged in poems, sentences, paragraphs, scenes, chapters, prologues, epigraphs, epilogues, keening songs, happiness songs, epilogues and blessings.

It. The moment. The precipice.

A memoir can wake you in the middle of the night- say at 1:55 a.m. and say to you, “Now. It is time to write.”

A memoir can save a reader’s life, remind her what it means  to nurture by centering her heart on the page, in the kitchen, the garden, the forest, the ecology of her life. Perhaps she will consider, carefully, what she sets aflame and to remember, again, that each flame is a beginning. A gathering of kindling and a composition inside a ring of stones and a stacking of materials to add to the flame. And, when she is ready, she can strike flint to steel, light the tinder and breathe in love and breathe out gratitude.

  • A memoir can be a way of pacifying the ego or of telling the go- this is when we let go.

  • A memoir is a moment. A memoir of the moment.

  • No need for flashbacks. Indirect discourse encouraged.

__________

Venus is visible on the night of this dreaming. Venus is about love.

From Grief to Grace

__________

Dream last night- a life review- a photo album and experience of flow, all the times flow has been with me, blockages released, like black flies in the spring, hatching and moving on…

___________

What does it mean to listen to the field? To sense the field? To hear the cosmos seeking? To connect with the benevolent beings?

_________

Also visible in this night sky: Jupiter. Optimism, growth, abundance.

Dispatch from audio recording, Part 2

Dispatch on a memoir. How is writing a memoir an appropriate response to the way the world is today? What are key things that are pointers? Pointers from a radical trust in life? Question mark.

Hannah, the movie, A recognition of a couple of things. They are gone in a stream of thinking. And I know I will remember them when I need to. I am part of a field, and in the field is all the thinking. And I could just access it.

____________

Mars. Energy, drive, passion, determination,

I will try voice to text. I really love to be able to call out the punctuation and find it complete.

On fear, perhaps this whole book is about fear. It is about a moment when fear seems to have abated, and inside the gap between “what if I am punished for this" and “thank you for releasing me from my fear.” This is a space of uncertainty. Perhaps I will be punished in some way. Right now it seems, speech and freedom are not as secure as I believed they would be for the rest of my life. And yet, was that just a comfortable notion? Have I been carrying the fear of my ancestors, all my life, the fear, speaking out of telling the truth?

I remember a piece from the movie Hannah that seems important the Rinpoche hands her a note and just says with the right motivation, everything will be clear. You will have all you need. And she and her partner Ollie set out to do what must’ve seemed impossible many, many times. Why this movie? Why on the anniversary of an experience that helped me see the invisible?

Breathe in love, breathe out gratitude.

__________

These are all the notes from last night and in the middle of the night, awake and alert I thought, wow, all I need to do is open the channel and the words will be there. Now, I have a bit of doubt. They were pointers, a dream I became aware of… Possible, perhaps because I am making space in my life. Space for what wants to come in, what might be created.

D. Nicol yesterday talked about the sacred trees in Montgomery…the redwoods and how her let the prayers come into him and through him. He didn’t set out to pray. The praying happened. He wasn’t directed by a religious figure, he was called by the trees. How, over time, he understood the trees were not a metaphor but a literal guide. A literal understanding.

Notes:

  1. Light editing used to add to coherence.

  2. Hannah, the movie refers to a movie on YouTube about a woman named Hannah who followed a buddhist path and helped to widen the reach of buddhist practices to Europe.

  3. D. Nicols is a subtle activist. I meditate with a group of people most Tuesday afternoons, participating and engaging with a field of energy with an embodiment of peace, beauty, and love.

  4. Reviewing these dispatches have alerted to me patterns in my dreaming, my thinking and my energetic engagement with life. The anniversary I note refers to an awakening experience which occurred on April 8, 2021.

Releasing the Petals...Dispatch from February 14, 2023

Dispatch from the Arbornaut. February 14, 2023

Note: This is part of a continuing series of randomly-chosen dispatches I’ve written. There are dozens and dozens of them. I am engaged in a process to release the petals to the wind. To start each moment fresh. I am asking “What am I clinging to for fear of nothing to take its place?” It is okay that you, the reader, do not know any of the names mentioned in this post. Please read for the energy. Notice how you experience the text…

Took a photo just now of my office space. Just directly, but slightly askew because of the angle of my chair to face the widest part of the room, reach the furthest corners with my gaze from atop my podium. And today I am sitting on top of my meditation cushion in the chair. With a heating pad across my back. I find heat on my back to be so comforting.

When I am at a retreat, sometimes dinner conversations or lunch conversations skew me in an unanticipated direction. Once, one of the participants says, “you know what a hand held against the shoulder means? What it represents? What we experience it as?” I wait for him to answer. “Support. It’s so obvious. Support!” We laugh and we slip into a bit of a collective sigh, each of us noticing how thinking of the action evokes the feeling, the memory, of how powerful memory is.

How I show up matters. I’ve been writing this on the scroll for several days now. And I’m having  a panoramic experience of what showing up looks like and about how it matters. I think when I’m calm and accepting, I create waves of it around me. I think my ability to power my body’s physical calm. My mind’s calm. I balance many moods. Not just my own. I’m committed to noticing how my experience of calm floats among the ones I love. How my experience of anxiety is related to the experiences I’m creating in response to the external stimuli. My body tells me what it is experiencing.

Today it has experienced a period of unease, of relaxing, of meeting, of appreciating, of joy, of engagement, of joy, of love, of awe, of sadness and strength surrounding a death…details below:

Dear T and P,

I dreamed of you both today. At about 1 p.m. I was working quietly and I felt a huge tug. A pull to meditate. Almost immediately, T, you were there. You were trying to get me ready. You needed me to get into meditation. Now. K and L and B needed us and you’ve been calling and I haven’t been answering but what matters is I’m here. What matters is I’m here. I try to understand where here is. And then I hear…How you show up matters. And I say, I’ve been writing that on my scroll for days. How you show up matters.

T: “That’s been me! I’ve been calling you!!

Me:  Really? You?

T: No. A whole group of us. Not just me. You’re in a group. Oh, you’ll see.

The narrative ends for awhile and I feel. My body becomes acutely focused. I feel like I’m speeding by life, zooming. Like I can see it all  passing so quickly. And I love this feeling. I play with it. Finally I slow it down. I can feel the feeling of slowing down the breath, breathing from a closer locus.

The narrative begins to rev up as the body calms down.

And in my dream I’m in a circle, we’re all there, a big group and we’re holding hands, all of us. And we meditate together and we move into particle phase and then light. We’re pure light. Pinpricks in the air. And B is there and we have a 360 degree view from wherever we are, we can always see them (K/l and B) and T is able to pinpoint where our attention needs to go.

“Mar’ce! Mar’ce! Over here.” T is directing traffic from her spot. I can see the shape of T, the swing of her hair, the force of her body, the slightest of haze of T.

“I need you to listen.” (You are my mother now, trying to help me get through some trouble we’ve fallen into, only in this case we’re here in gratitude. Thankfulness. Full of heart.)

“You’re here for a reason. Focus. L. K. B. Flow between them.”

We are a dome of pinpricks of light. We shine all around the three of them and our energy surges in response to theirs. K and L get glimpses of us. B sees us. More of us. And then she sees us all. She begins to relax. Her breathing relaxes. She experiences the in-between, the reciprocal space between…

“Mom. I’m really, really, really sorry. I love you.”

“B, we are glad you are healthy in your heart. You know love. That is the most important thing.”

“Thank you.”

“Thank you.”

“Thank you.”

The flow of energy moves in waves, long and gentle and short and choppy. It’s a record. A symphony. A movement of love.

Much more happens but I can’t remember now. I think it’s meant to be shared in a different format or a different context.

I had that experience. Today.

And, I wrote this too: as if the context were slightly different when I met T and P in a lucid dream.

“Wow. It’s so amazing you’re here. We’ve been totally waiting on you. We knew you’d find us.

What a cool way to live.

Totally. That’s P speaking. It’s great. I like the drinks by the pool. Just kidding.

Is this real?

Yes. T says.

So today has been an interesting sort of day. Full of adventure I didn’t expect. Buying glasses today was expensive and an investment in my sight and my fashion. I’ve decided I need to replace my warped lenses (too much heat) and lean into something funny and different. I’m talking with colleague B in 15 minutes about writing circles. Need to get them set up. Will sign off for now. Off to do a task. : )

M

(And I’m experiencing events as big feelings and the bridge between the events is the narrative. And the big experiences are like bursts and waves of energy. So the narrative can really get interesting around the bursts and waves of energy, it can try to flow against the push against them. Or it can flow.)

A Writing Experiment. Dispatch, November 20, 2024

Thank you to all the writers I’ve learned from and worked with, all the shared inspiration over this life and any other lives who are invisible to or unremembered by me.

I offer this experiment freely with the intention of inspiring you to connect with the inner you, the inner one who carries stories, who receives stories, who tells stories. Our energy follows our stories.

What story is at the center of the spiral? What stories form the form? The shell? The staircase? The plant? The DNA of our body? How is this writing experiment going to spiral out from here?

Here is a writing experiment I’ve undertaken with a several writing nests. I understand the thinking behind paywalls and protecting our work from being used, again and again, and not being compensated or paid. I appreciate the importance of reminding ourselves of the value of the gifts we share with others.

As you write, you may notice a longing for connection with other writers. Connection = being witnessed and witnessing.

I notice we contain multitudes. My identities include: writer, friend, forest walker, listener, work culture participant, ritual maker, plant communicator, canine nurturer, woman, intellectual, canoeist, creator with my hands, nutrition student, be-ing, grandmother, mother, partner, ex-many things.

Each of these identities is in relationship. Each of these relationships expands or contracts based on my participation. The ability to be present, to be both the observed and the observer, to be in a loop of reciprocity, a giving and a receiving, this is the place of practice. Sweetness might be here. Waves of emotion.

In our relationship with writing, we might feel pressure to achieve an expected outcome. In relationship with other writers, the expectations we have for an audience, for our own success, might recede into the background. We might notice the relationship of writer to words, of writer to writers, of words to words, is the presence we’ve been seeking. It’s the reality in action of being seeing and seeing another.

To write/create alone may feel safe. To write/create in a group may feel unsafe.

What do you want for your life?

Who do you want to be?

What kinds of experiences do you want to have?

What are you willing to invest in your becoming?

Sometimes the head feels heavy. Dispatch from May 27, 2025

Sometimes the head feels heavy.

the spirit animal of the exhausted…

The eyelids want to close against any more doing. The body wants to rest, to attend to the quiet, the still, the inside centre point.



Sometimes the throat feels full. Forceful. Buzzy. Sometimes it seems to ignite the jaw and illicit the biting of the tongue or the relaxing of the jaw. Relax the throat.



Hear the birds sing.

Listen.

To the speed, the force of the sound. Imagine where it comes from, the belly and through the esophagus and into the beak positioned just so and with the force needed, the intent behind the sound, the meant-expression. The emotion.

Sometimes the throat feels like a birds’. And the shoulders like folded wings.

what emerges from the spine…

Sometimes the feet root into the ground. You might learn it in yoga– how to spread the toes, bend the knees slightly, let the weight descend through the legs, through the feet, into the floor and beyond, an energetic cord of connection between the body, the hips and legs and feet, into the centre of the earth, the lava core. The feet are rooted, being met with resistance, meeting resistance.

Sometimes the feet root into the ground and the head is connected to the sky. You might learn it in Qi Gong; this method of connecting earth and sky in the body and extending the energetic signature of the body and finding the flow of energy moving from earth to sky and then balancing.

You might think you’re just trying a bit of everything and mastering nothing. Or you might be developing dozens of perspectives on a subject you’re just not aware of, a question you haven’t been aware you’re asking. A question like…what is energy? What is a body?

In totality. From all perspectives. You might get into all of this investigation and curiousness and notice you’re being berated by self-criticism and a desire to be different from who you are. You might notice you learn to like yourself more because you know more about how skilled you are, how marvelous a body really is, what a miracle it is you’re alive.

You might think thinking about death is ______________ . It’s okay. Death is weird.

You might like spring the most because that’s when there is proof again, life continues.

You might like winter the most because it reminds you of death and, somehow, the idea that all this work might be over one day feels good.

You might wonder if plastic surgery is a better option than learning to love yourself just as you are. You might wish you were the kind of mom who would have no problem getting botox by the orthodontist when she’s finished fitting your 10 year old with Invisiline retainers. You might experiment with interventions of one kind or another, addictions, ways of avoiding, ways of getting what you want. You might become a heavy consumer of solutions. Solutions to problems you don’t have to take on. You might see your life as one of many, not so special, glad to have gotten this far, and you might wonder, why spend time sharing this story? Who needs to know what you survived? How will it help them? Billions of people are speaking. Don’t we need more silence? Aren’t you tired of someone trying to sell you their version of the truth?

Sometimes the head is heavy when you sit down to write. Sometimes you remember life as if it were a movie and you think the dreaming part is always so good, why not get to it right now. But…you remember a voice from earlier suggesting, your story matters. You remember the session in the therapist’s office about your shame. You experienced your shame. Let it have its say. Through the body. All that feeling. The clenching of the jaw, the gripping of the arms of the chair, how you thought you might rip them off, the overwhelming desire to run, the tears, the drama of it all. Moaning. Clutching your stomach. A movie of the past, replaying. The desire to vomit a boa constrictor of grief squeezing, squeezing, squeezing, from your gut to your throat. Coming back to the room, you remember a moment of strength.

You said, no.

Remember?

You said, no.

Finally, the boa lets go. You wondered if it would be helpful for the woman-trainee therapist to witness an unguarded truth. If sharing a story matters.

We are here for a reason. You and I together.

Yes, we are.

We do not have to be good. To be aware is enough.

I’m publishing a series of dispatches I’ve written/or spoken into a voice memo app and, then, transcribed. They are from a past version of Mar’ce who is also part of this-moment-Mar’ce. : ) I choose them randomly and edit them lightly. Some of them have been shared in small group settings. Most have not been read once they’ve been written.

I notice I stopped sharing widely a couple of years ago. I notice my break had to do with imagining an invisible audience who is potentially critical/judgemental/unkind. I noticed, too, I don’t want to participate In sharing on instagram or Facebook or linked in. I’ve been sporadically experimenting with sub stack. What a wonderful period of time it has been to not share or not share much! What a gift it’s been to germinate, to rest, to experience the events of life slowly and with curiousness! Thank you for reading. I so appreciate your attention. Your curiosity matters. Your attention matters. What are you germinating??

I notice the wind today

I notice the wind today. Steady, strong exhales. Gratitude for all of us who are breathing in the earth’s love. 

I wonder how many readers have decided this blog post is not for them after the first three sentences. I wonder how many readers have noticed a curiosity rising, a flow of inner energy that is like a tickle in their mind, a trickle of wonder. 

I notice the chickadee tree. Also known as pine tree. Also known as welcoming tree as it grows near the front door of the house. Shading the pine tree’s roots is the prairie-dog-lookout-rock also known as the chickadee perch and the dog-marking-place. I notice the tree moves with the wind, not in one big sway, but many small shudders, adjusting and flowing with the wind; the only resistance, an adapting trunk. I notice chickadee tree grows stronger with each gust. I notice it enjoys the chickadees' call to me, keep going…I believe in you.

I tattooed the word believe on my wrist in my 40th year, after my birthday, when I made a vow to write a novel to carry me through the grief of all that I’d lost when I lost my mother to an early death, 54 years old. I despaired when the publishing of the novel did not bring her back to me, did not help me to settle into my forever-changed life. 

Believe. The word is not as easy to read now, as it was then. My wrists have grown, impossibly, thinner and unless I soothe the skin with lotion, the inky text seems like a grouping of symbols. If it were a Boggle board, I would say it says many things: Live. Be. Veil. Evil. Bee. Vibe. Vile.

The novel, Wicked Sweet, is a tale of a young woman unable to live up to her mother’s expectations and abandoned by her best friend. She adopts Nigella Lawson as her fairy godmother, a sensuous woman who loves food. The young woman sets out a plan to steal back her best friend. The obstacle to their friendship, she decides, is a young man who overpowers our protagonist with his meanness. She bakes cakes, leaves them anonymously on doorsteps and, through actions playing out more and more confusion, attempts to exact revenge on the young man. She believes this revenge will result in everyone seeing, clearly, his malevolent ways and casting him aside. She will be the heroine of all of the story. She will win the affection of her friend and, indeed, of everyone. She will be safe, loved, and in control of a certain future of everything-is-nigella-lawson-great. 

I notice my mother used to say, I don’t get angry, I get even. 

I, too, have watched this play out in my own life. 

Belief is limiting. Stating the kind of person you are, from only one perspective, is limiting. 

Creating something new can be confusing, can set you apart, can free you and can also trap you.

I notice if I call the tree in front of the house by one name, perhaps its science-given-name, then I may stop noticing. That’s all it is. That’s what I’ve been told. A tree is a genus. It has parts, logically arranged. It is only a function of evolution. A tree. 

Not the pine in front of the house, but a pine I visit often. I call them Lone Pine. Pictured here with one of dozens of small pines in the boulder field at the bottom of Ghost Lake Dam, along the Bow River.

But…what if, like each of us, we saw the tree from many perspectives. What would we come to understand? What might our relationship become? 

I notice my mother was much more than a woman who said, I don’t get angry, I get even. Which, by the way, was not an honest statement because she did get angry. And she did get even. She tried to warn others around her that they might see her as powerless, but she was not. I’m not sure how many opportunities she exercised her power and her voice with compassion, but I remember her kindnesses towards me as drops of the sweetest nectar.

I dedicated the novel Wicked Sweet to my daughter. She said to me when I was depressed and sad and  I couldn’t seem to write anything, “write about something you love, Mom. I know you can do it. You are a good writer.”


I notice how much I love trees. How much I’ve learned from them. How I’ve begun to feel their presence in my day-dreams and night-dreams and how I seek out their wise counsel. Sometimes the ones you love can speak in ways to remind you of your goodness, your skill, your meaning in life. 

I write today of something I love. The pine.

I wrote this today for myself. These last two lines were added to complete an assignment for a Memoir Writing Course.

What does the protagonist want: To prove her worth, the validity of her belief in the trees. 

What does the protagonist need: To trust that she is overflowing with enoughness. No matter her beliefs, she is worthy of love. 

Ecology of Thriving: Peace in the Doing...

We, in relationship to all, can thrive.

We, in relationship to beliefs we don’t adopt, can thrive.

We, in relationship to pain, suffering and the dying, can thrive.

We, in relationship to all, must thrive.

Our strength, our vision, our compassion, our balance, our willingness to face all that is upon us: we are the thriving ones.

An ecosystem = strengths in action, communication, direct assistance, regulation for homeostasis.

Who are we? What is our true nature? Where are we from?

Why ask these questions?

To see beyond winners and losers.

To see beyond good guys and bad guys.

To see beyond our fears for the future.

To see deeply.

To experience safety which doesn’t depend on who is elected, how much money is in our bank account, our workplace culture, and the changing climate.

Safety does not equal hibernation. Safety does not equal rest. Safety does not equal shelter. Safety does not equal a full cupboard of food.

Safety equals a confidence in knowing, whatever comes my way, I will respond with clarity, without fear– I will welcome challenge. I will meet my moments with curiousity, with a desire to be here. And, here. And, here.

We move from one state to another, over and over. Through direct experience we learn who we are, where we are from, and our true nature…our strengths, our basic goodness, and our connection to all in the ecosystem.

Change happens. Movement happens. We live in a verb world. We are verbs.

caterpillar, cocoon, imaginal goo, emerge, flight.

Ice to water. Water to earth. Water to plant, human, animal.

Water to gas. Gas to cloud. Cloud to rain. Rain to river, to land, to plant, human, animal.

We are verbs. We have the capacity to think new thoughts about safety, about love, about money, about loneliness, about care, about wholeness.

Energy follows thought.

Move towards? Run from?

Together?

Stand in beauty. Stand in wildness.

In darkness, light finds light.

We can use our minds to remain trapped or we can use our minds to find freedom.

Our minds can help us create islands of sanity all around us.

Our minds can help us innovate and thrive.

Our minds can help us to become vessels of peace.

Energy is possibility. We are energy.

We are beings of possibility.

Our thoughts and our actions create our world.

We are we.

We are all.

All is all.

Let there be peace.

Currency of light.

Are We the world worth saving?

Here is a newsletter/email I sent out today…

Yesterday was Lughansa, August 1st, a day of celebration for  some of my ancestors, a day of joy and gratitude– the harvest is here. If you've opened up this e-mail, Thank You. If you decide to read it all the way through, Thank you. If you end up at the bottom and click, yes, to any of the invitations I'm offering, Thank You. 

      I walked a path today through wild roses and trembling aspens with a big blue sky overhead. Barefoot, I stopped on a hill and laid down. I felt the cells of my whole being in vibration with the earth. A deep sense of calm and steadiness filled me. I continue to hold the calm as I write to you now. 

      I have three purposes today:

  • We are the world worth saving, a definition. 

  • An unfolding pathway.

  • Three invitations based on We are the world worth saving.

    bonus…Gifts for writers and peace lovers.

We are the world worth saving, a definition.

       I've been hearing this phrase in my thoughts and my dreams: We are the world worth saving. Seriously. Today it appears I am going to take responsibility for these words. Even though I notice a younger version of me is afraid someone will disagree, today's version of myself is interested in a conversation, many conversations.

       We are the world worth saving. 

       We as in: all. 

       We as in: you and me and all. 

       We as in: you, me, them, river, ocean, rose, tree, mouse, elephant, mountain, and all.

    I notice when I'm in despair about the world, I forget we are a we. 

    "What can I do to help?" I think or "How can I not think about this anymore?"

     I also forget all of life is founded on basic goodness. I notice my caught-up-ness with the details of the unfolding events. Scrolling increases. Wandering around with my mind buzzing. I begin to internalize feelings of division and hopelessness. 

     "I can't do anything to change this situation." 

     Loneliness shows up. 

     Oh, my. The stories I can imagine about how bad it can all get, how bad it has been. 

     Bad. Bad. Bad. 

    Then, the ember of worthiness glows deep within me and, eventually, I feel warmth. I notice my heart and mind opening. I let in pain and suffering. I breathe out calm and good wishes. I learned this practice as Tonglen. (meaning: giving and receiving)

     I notice an emotion takes about 90 seconds to run all through the body. 

     Dislodging a stuck emotion, the remainder of a division of some sort, can take years and years. Little bits of relief, letting pain in from a traumatic memory and breathing out calm, matters. Breathing in others' pain and breathing out calm can become almost like a muscle memory. 

     Sometimes we go a lifetime with an obstacle inside us we never identify, we grow crankier and crankier, we avoid certain topics of conversation or people or situations we don't like. We don't want to be triggered by anything, anywhere. I spent a lot of time avoiding triggers. 

      My experience is: building capacity in the inner experience needs space. Spaciousness is a physical situation- an open heart is more spacious than a clenched heart, the gut can feel tight or relaxed and spacious, the mind can be obsessively thinking or we might notice the gap/the space between thoughts. Often, we need time and tools to develop space. Letting go of stories (which take up a ton of space) can be a challenge. 

    So...why engage in all of this work? Why go canoeing when we can sit on a beach and have the drinks brought to us? Why work through stuck emotions? Why willingly experience pain?  Watching the Olympics, I wonder if the athletes push themselves physically because the arena of physically-meeting-an-edge is where they want to play.

    The arena I want to play in? Peace. 

    Peace is the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual arena of our times. 

    I just wrote that. Is it true? I don't know.

     I was born in 1966 (my birthday is 18 days from now!) and I've read: babies born in this year share an experience of wanting peace. The Vietnam War was on. Star Trek debuted on television in September. The pull of peace was in the air, the cosmos. My direct experience tells me peace means being open to the uncertainty of life, of things falling apart. It's responding with clarity and compassion, sitting with fear and anger and joy and love simultaneously, holding space for whatever arises, and not fearing or grasping the outcome. Peace. 

    Peace is my experience of the We. It's my sandbox. It's how I'm playing with life. My three invitations are to ask you to join me in this big peace experiment where Deep Listening, Deep Play and Deep Trust work through us. 

    Peace is possible. 

    Peace begins in one expression of being. 

    We are the expression. 

    We are the world worth saving. 

My pathway. 

If you know me, you probably know I'm a writer with a love of all words (especially yours!) and a woman who has restarted her life more than once. 

You likely know me as a curious and playful person. Perhaps, too, as serious about what it means to care about another, open-hearted and open-minded, willing to learn, persistent, a lover of cake and cookie, and in the last ten years especially, a human with a beautiful relationship with our natural world. 

As I near my 58th birthday, I can point to a few choices I made over the last 10 years which have brought me to this moment. I share them with you for context, perhaps for my own clarity to see how I got here today, to write this newsletter and send it out:

  • I didn't know how to live the life I was living anymore. I applied and accepted the invitation for a canoe trip with Outward Bound Canada, specially designed for women who'd experienced violence in their lives. On a solo-night on a tiny island in Desolation Sound, I wrote myself a letter. My wilderness coaches mailed it to me six months later. I wrote to myself, You will be in healthy relationships and canoeing will be part of your life from now on. 

  • I learned to hike and camp alone and to love it.

  • I met extraordinary humans at pivotal points who helped me cultivate positivity and clarity.

  • I quit a job I loved in arts management. Despair lived inside me for many months.

  • One of my children told me they didn't want to talk to me anymore because I didn't listen. I trained myself to listen, fully. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. 

  • Two granddaughters came into my life. I wanted to show up for them even when I didn't think I could.

  • I started and completed an MFA in Creative Writing. 

  • I spent two weeks with the Indigenous Leadership group at the Banff Centre for the Arts- one program on Right Relationship, the other on the ways of Indigenous Leadership. 

  • I took over 58 courses/workshops on-line and in-person on topics from baking to writing to becoming a Bodhisattva (a warrior for the human spirit) with Margaret Wheatley

  • I dreamed of buying a house near nature with my daughter and son-in-law so the grandchildren could play outside. We bought one. 

  • I canoed lakes and rivers in long journeys with my steady and skilled canoe partner, Tom, who was forced to change his life after a physical disability at age 28. He holds a phd in Peace Studies. The word peace really excites me. haha. 

  • I experienced so much fear I put us in danger on a canoe trip. Joy Harjo's poem, Fear, I Give you Back, has helped me let go of my grip on fear. 

  • I've written hundreds of pages of a novel I do not want to end. I love the characters. I love the horror story they're navigating. I love the place where they live- Ghost River Wilderness. The genre: Mountain Gothic. 

  • I've published short stories and essay pieces and worked on a wonderful novel.

  • I nurture nests of writers who are brilliant and compassionate. 

  • Writing nests have led to the development of deep noticing as a key part of nurturing a peaceful life. 

  • I'm in collaboration with some wonder-humans. I look forward to all of you meeting one day. 

  • I'm letting go of story after story, even the ones who have been the catalyst for my biggest insecurities and my biggest successes. The stories all seem to have a pleasantness about them as they drift away, even the worst of them, a bundle of memories about what I learned then. 

  • I notice I'm carrying the peace I've been seeking.

My Invitations.

      I've been in retreat for the past several weeks. My retreat space: one-on-one relationships with family and friends, strangers who become friends, with dog Athena, with water, with plant after plant after plant. I've been asking big questions about the narrative I weave in my head of the world I've Iived in and the world I'm living in now, at this moment. 

     Now, I'm metaphorically paddling the canoe in the middle of the river and I don't know what's up ahead. I know what I have in the canoe. I know what I sense around me. I am keen. 

   If you've read this far, thank you- again!- my inbox is full of wonderful newsletters I read or don't depending on the day. As I mentioned, I love learning experiences. I love experimenting. I am keen to experiment and play with anyone who is curious about what I'm putting together... 

 Here are my invitations: 

Cabin Falls 2024: Retreat and Write

Six days and five nights in one-of-kind luxury and people

  • Increase Spaciousness in your life.

  • Experience doing one thing at a time.

  • Engage in deep noticing; build your muscle memory for accessing presence in each moment. 

  • Will my wellness last? Is this enough of a beginning? Is it possible? Of course it is. 

  • Research shows 72 hours in nature leads to wellness. Sweden is trying this, too! 

  • It is possible to experience life in many different ways. It is possible to spend six days and five nights in one of the most incredible places on earth. Imagine the energy of water falling. Imagine the moon gathering us in her fullness. (full moon alert!)

  • Writing and sharing is always by invitation to express whatever arises. Writers are often surprised with the goodness they find showing up. 

  • So much can be seen when you're guided by the stewards of the land, when you're playing with deep noticing practices. 

  • Yes, it's worth the cost. Yes, it's worth the time and the travel to arrive. 

The official invitation is attached to this email. You can also find more information on my website. Here. 

Writing Nests, Fall 2024
Early Registration for Writing Nests begins on August 4. 

Some details:

  • Limited to six writers per nest. 

  • We begin in October.

  • Weekday mornings, afternoons and evenings will be available.

  • Scheduled for 1.5 hours with a five minute break partway through.

  • You can curate your own writing nest with friends/family.

  • Sliding fee scale always available

  • Format: meet the screen with ease, engage with a playful invitation to notice, take action: move, listen to the inner body, write, share the present moment and presence. 

  • Deep Listening. Deep Play. Deep Trust. 

If the world is falling apart, what can you do? Clear your perspective. Become an island of sanity for all you love. We need you.  

Peace Practices, Fall 2024

Early Registration for Peace Practices begins on August 4.

Some details:

  • Free. 

  • Sent to your inbox on Sunday and Wednesday.

  • Playful invitations for expression.

  • A monthly zoom call.

Peace Is. Deepen Your Experience.

You can also schedule 20 minute meetings with me.  



Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. 



So much gratitude in my life today. 

My apologies if you run into any issues with navigating my website. I'm doing the best I can with the energy I've been allotted in this life! 



The target of your anger.

The target of your anger: a list of most unwanted.

a non-listener

a betrayer

a coward

a bully

a former-friend

a misguided __________

a lonely ___________

a thief

an ignorant _____________

a harmful ____________

war-mongerer

peace killer.

The target of your anger: an awakening

a doorway to feeling

the depth of emotion

to meet yourself, also, as

non-listener

betrayer,

war-monger,

peace killer.

To accept the truth: we all have the capacity to harm

To start where you are.

To begin with what you have.

Walk to the store. Pick up any object.

Remember how you once stole something from a store or wanted to.

Let your body feel the pull of wanting.

Let it rise. Let it fall.

Put the object back on the shelf.

To want is human.

At the checkout, choose a line with a human behind the cash register.

Look at them with both of your eyes, with your full attention.

Say thank you.

Say have a nice day.

Mean it.

This could be another beginning.

Create the Conditions for Sanity and Love

An Arbornaut’s Dispatch: Friday, September 15, 2023. 

I woke up a bit grumpy this morning. Bear-aware weary. I slept intermittently, vigilant for the snuff of a snout, the breaking of a branch. I had not set any alarms- maybe a bell on a string between two trees and in the space between us and where we cooked our food- I had no tools or experience of doing so. I listened to the loons calling out late, a few long sounds echoing across Lake Marie Louise in Sleeping Giant Provincial Park near Thunderbay. We slept in the wilderness walk-in campsites, away from running water, and lights, and far away from our closest campers. It’s as wild as car camping in a national park can get. And, yet, it felt very wild. 

The special notice on our park pass: “Recent black bear activity in compound. ZERO tolerance for unattended wildlife attractants.”

I like wildness. I like feeling a bit scared and sleeping outside. I like the sounds and smells, the petrichor (the scent of the world after it rains) that night in particular. 

Tom was bear aware last night, especially anything related to food. We walked the dirty dishwater back up the path to the road where we left our car. We tried to keep things clean. Except, I wasn’t very bear aware earlier, when I was starting to make dinner. We arrived at about 6:30 which is early for us but we’re in trees and the lake is in a wide valley area so it was near-dark upon our arrival. So my focus is on hurrying. How do I do more things at once and all of these things faster?


I felt like I was a mom of five kids again, worrying for future Mar’ce’s future. Trying to get everything done all at once so future Mar’ce could rest, feel less stress. So… I missed the opportunity to do my part, front-line, of keeping us protected from the bear. 

We had car camping ingredients: red curry paste, rice noodles, red pepper, and Tom’s homegrown shallots and strips of raw chicken. Each time I handle slippery chicken meat, I grieve for the chicken who died. Slippery chicken feels so alive to me. And I thank the chicken. This occupation with my being-to-being responsibility is also one of my focuses and, therefore, might have contributed to my lessening bear awareness as I cut raw chicken on a table about 200 feet from where we would be sleeping. 

Photographed by someone else…

The cutting board swam in raw chicken juice and ice water that had seeped in through the packaging. Raw chicken juice dripped from the cutting board onto the picnic table and onto the ground. A bear smelling the petrichor of raw chicken juice infused forest would come looking for cheap happy hour. 

I could not bring myself to tell Tom. I carried the small scary truth inside me. I rationalized: I can’t add to his worry. Honestly, he keeps me so safe. He protects me from a whole lot of harm because I can attend very closely to one thing and not sense the bigger thing happening around me or behind me. He is aware of so much: the possibility for danger in the landscape, the weather, the roadway, time of day. His experience is wide and deep when it comes to the wilderness. He can alert me to signs, patterns in forms and movement. But, he has one area of weakness: sound. 

As I read this to Tom, he says, “What?”

“Sound,” I say. You can’t hear. 

Sound Waves. Sonic Resonance. What is not heard might be felt??

Something we don’t talk about is: Tom’s hearing is not as reliable as it once was. 

Three summers ago, I heard a bear moving through the forest towards us, breaking branches. 

On a bright morning in August three summers ago, I heard the bear we would end up having a serious and heart-pumping conversation with… 

Tom didn’t hear anything. 

He listened to me, though, and maybe he sensed the bear. Certainly he knew the bear or anything else in the forest would be interested in our food. Our food barrel, lid off, seemed like an invitation to a friend. We weren’t vigilant that day. If we had been vigilant we might have met the bear later in the day, maybe even during the night when we were sleeping. Instead, we survived a stand-off of epic proportions with both Tom’s face and the bear’s face mirroring each other’s What the Hell expression. And, me, I practiced unholstering the bear spray. And then the bear backed away from us and the food barrel, climbed a tree. The bear grumped and humpfed and Tom repeated, over and over, “Hey, Bear, this is our food. Our food. We don’t want any trouble.” The bear, 15 feet up in the tree was so pissed off or scared, he shit down the tree. It’s hard to know exactly how he felt, but did it matter with a marker like that? The bear stretched into a sort of cat yoga pose while holding onto the tree, arched back, butt hovering. A bomb of poop exploded and arced through the sky, fell and fell, smacking leaves and branches. 

We left right away. Took us way too long to pack up the tent, the food, all of it and we’d planned to have a great day of adventure there. We had no reason to complain in the adventure department. 

A sign we could have posted.

So…all of this leads me back to last night. The night when I didn’t sleep well. 

Tom and me are surviving this adventure. Together. With each other. And Athena. Athena is part of the whole story, of course. If not for her, we wouldn’t stop at three lakes a day to walk the shore and throw sticks and play. 

I stayed awake because I was afraid of the bear. Of having set up the precise situation where a bear would arrive in camp. Not that I don’t like telling real-life stories of bear encounters, but, the danger is real. Who knows how anything is going to react in a situation they haven’t encountered. 

So…I was grumpy.

__________________

We packed everything up amid my long sighs, my near crying episode, my long stalk down the road and back. And as we drove, I tried to relax my body, let the stress go. Build some space in for future Mar’ce to have a break. 

In all of my grumpiness I blasted, perhaps like the bear and the poop, that maybe I was tired of routine: drive till dark, eat, put up tent, sleep, wake up, do the same thing, over and over. Drive every day. I may have gotten firm in my desire to be heard. I like to create, I said. I miss creating. 

Obviously, I’d run out of imagination for what fun I might have in the rain. I avoided thinking about another possibility than “I need to be dry tonight.” We drove towards the dog-friendly new hotel in Hearst, Ontario and the rest of the decisions fell into place. Tom wanted me to enjoy camping. He enjoyed camping. I needed a break from being bear aware or rain weary.

Was I prepared for nine nights on the water and land? We’ve done this many ties, This in-between time of the journey makes me uncertain of my future- terrific time to realize I am more than I think I am. Stronger. More capable. More connected. 

We listened to CBC radio Thunderbay as we drove highway 11. Mid-morning programming on CBC Radio is a call-in show, about the Right to Repair bills being introduced and passed through the world. The good news is: we might get our appliances repaired instead of adding them to the landfill. The bad news: so much complaining, and anything without add-on gadgets (ice/water dispensers, ice machines, electronic anything) will last longer than we expect. 

CBC Radio reminds me of both old and new, old and new.

On Highway 11, we travel some of the prettiest highway scenery of our trip. Low clouds drift and dissolve in branches of evergreen and birch, yellow-leaves still hanging on. Steep cliffs rise up, like waking giants on either side of the highway, surrounding lake after lake after lake. 

Radio caller: “You don’t get anything that lasts 38 years old nowadays, but my Maytag washer just died.”

We are in the country of the rock palisades, north of north. We are in the land of the Raven. We are in the land of the Black Bear. We are listening to CBC radio. 

Radio special guest from ifix-it: “Our appliances are complicated. They are not robust and reliable.”

Radio caller pro tip: “We fixed our stove with a q-tip, rubbing alcohol, and a you tube video.” 

Radio special guest: “If you look at restaurant stoves, there are no electronics. Cooks who rely on their equipment need robust and reliable.”

Boreal Forest. Stock image. This scene seen many times though.

Soon we will be in the forest with a butane/propane stove to boil water, to heat our dehydrated veggie curry and spaghetti sauce and noodles. Robust. Reliable. 

______________ 

Athena Swimming at a Lake off HWY 11, Macdiarmid. A scottish/irish lad visited here once.

By the time we were at first lake stop and I met Cedar by the water and Birch in the middle of the grassy picnic area, my mood had lifted, like a weight growing lighter or a veil of fog clearing. 

Clouds hung all around, but I found small flowers to notice closely and the whorls and knots of Birch. I took a photo of paper bits from a birch rolled like tiny scrolls. I imagined all the tiny invisible stories in all those scrolls. I picked up the garbage scattered on the ground: Labatt Blue beer cans and the case, some water bottle lids. 

My mind had been going as we drove, listening to the CBC radio show and thinking how it might be good for the world, you know, if we developed an understanding that each of us could, actually, learn how to repair our washer and stove and dishwasher, or maybe it would be just one person in our family, but somehow knowing this would help us learn how to repair other things, maybe relationships. People are really having a tough time getting along with each other right now. And, our relationship to the earth seems to require a listening process to understand the schematics, to learn how to communicate in a language of machine, of earth and human. We could become robust. We could become reliable.

Rest now. I heard the words as I was standing next to the Birch.

Rest. Listen. You’re on the right path. 

Sometimes this is how the path feels, no matter how beautiful the context.

Tom, Athena and I sat in the car while I wrote this:

We are at the picnic area with the concrete structures for toilets, five weather proof picnic tables, a birch with four fingers extending from an upturned palm. Birch’s four white primary trunks, like four long fingers extended from an opened palm, rise up straight and steady towards the sky. Sixty or seventy or one hundred long willowy branches rise up, too, their stems ranging from deep red in colour at the top of the tree to a dark brown nearing the bottom of the tree.

Birch’s profile is a column shape, a column of golden leaves with white stems of energy connecting sky and earth. Birch is a beauty. When I look now, I think I might see a face. A kind face. Long but with large vision faculties, not eyes, but space, space for reception of something else. The wind, maybe has shaped the growth of the leaves and the falling of them now. The wind whistles from the north east and it pushes the leaves in the middle and the top of the tree harder, these leaves take the biggest hit of wind, meet it head on and they fall fastest. Thank you Birch. Robust. Reliable. 

__________



Calgary Colours : FryWay 11: Leah and Marcia. Friendly. Curious. Adventurers in Food and Friendliness.

We stop at a FryTruck an hour after my encounter with Birch. First time this trip. Highway 11 is famous for FryTrucks, but we haven’t seen many. Two weeks from now, we’ll be out of luck because they’re out of season. But…today is extraordinary. We get out. Look over the menu. 

Leah Deans: Food truck owner and Face-at-the-window: How are you today?

Me: Good. Great. How are you? 

Leah: Living the Dream. 

Note the Specials Board. Recommended…to-go, after fries and a burger or fish…cream puffs or Nana’s banana bread…

And she is, she has been. It’s how she sees it. She always joked she and her mom would run a food truck one day. And they are. Marcia (Mom) is the cook in the truck today but they both love making good food. The short story is Leah and her husband and kids moved from Calgary to Kitchener, Ontario. Her husband learned chainsaw carving from the former owner of the chip truck who bought it for his kids and they worked it for three summers to pay for all their college expenses and to buy the truck! 

Leah: Fryway 11, I told my husband, wouldn’t it be a thing to have a food truck on Highway 11? 

She mentioned a chip truck isn’t the same as a food truck: fries and fries and fries are available in the most delicious combinations– hand cut and perfectly fried, with Quebec poutine (fries, Quebec cheese curds and gravy). Optional accoutrements: bacon, onion, sweet potato fries. Also, Burgers, Fish Fryday, Nana’s Banana bread, cream puffs. I want to buy some banana bread to go. Maybe cream puffs, too. My engagement in everything about Leah and the Fry Truck is so off the charts! 

As Leah widens the doorway to her ever expanding story and I meet her mom and ask question after question, I have a wondering. Often, I keep these wonderings to myself. Today, I did not. Perhaps comforted and emboldened by the Birch, I just let the words fall out of me: 

Me: Hey, Do you like writing?

Leah: Yes.

Me: Do you want to write your story?

Leah: I do.

Me: Oh. Great. I think you’d be great at it. It’s a great story. I’m a writer.

Leah: You’re a writer?

Nod of head.

Leah: Cool.

Me: I do all kinds of writing. Lots of projects. I’m in the middle of a project right now. 

Leah: You are?

Me: Yeah. A couple of times of year I facilitate circles for writers. I mostly meet people and ask them if they want to be part of something, like writing-wise. You might be interested.

Leah: I am. 

Me: Cool. They’d like you. I think you’d like them. 

What I didn’t say: it’s interesting how you talk about your future. How your future includes all your relationships. You remind me of someone I know. And your engagement with life? With strangers at a chip truck window? With your mom cooking next to you? With your husband and kids who are all part of adapting to a life far away from Calgary and the Ingelwood neighborhood where your mom and you lived? It’s inspiring. 

Leah: Mom and I spent six years apart and now we’re next level. Next level of life. 

Me: It’s wonderful. Your life is great. 

Leah: Becoming a pilot is my retirement plan. Not where I’m responsible for people. You know a Canada Post plane or FedEx. It’ll be expensive and it’ll take awhile, but what am I gonna do? I’m not gonna sit around my house knitting. I am not a knitter.”

Leah: I’m not gonna sit around my house knitting. I am not a knitter.

“Foods Up!” A second sliding window, near the truck’s rear wheels opens. Marcia hands us our food, a fork wrapped in a napkin. “These fly off on their own.”  

The smell. Yummmmmmm.

Not these fries, though these do look delicious like FryWayf ries. Their fries were so great, I did not think of taking a photo of them. I only wanted to engage with them hands-on. So…you’ll have to imagine hand cut fries. Although I will replace this photo with one of Leah’s if she sends me one!!!!

My meal is delicious- Sweet Potato Fry poutine, two pieces of Haddock and Fresh Fries shared with Tom. Cheese in all the correct gooey-ness. Dill sauce for the fish and lemon wedges.

We share a picnic table with a couple of local policeman from The Anishnaabeg Police force. They mention the weather has been overcast and cool for weeks, but farther east it’s 20 degrees and sunny. Maybe they want to reassure us we won’t be in rain for a week while we’re paddling. It’s not fun to pack and unpack a wet tent, but once you accept you have no other choice, it’s easy to do. 

(In an on-line drawing course with Janice Tanton I learned, draw what you see, not what you think you see and sketch lightly, find the line.)

I sketch, with beginner level skill, the Fry Truck in my watercolour notebook. I show it to Leah. She hands me some fancy stickers- FryWay 11 stickers. The stickers are AWESOME, but they are tucked away inside a book I cannot reach.

I started out grumpy. I ended up not. 

Change happened at a Park. Near Trees. At a FryTruck.

Thank you Leah. Thank you Marcia. Robust. Reliable. 


And This Thought from Chogyam Trunpa:

Sacred Names or Swear Words?

Chogyum Trunpa’s Commentary on the slogan: If you can practice even when distracted, you are well trained.

We have all kinds of situations that we have to handle in ordinary life, even states that we are not aware of. Usually, we are not particularly concerned about our existence; we are more concerned about our neurosis and our games. If we are in a very high level of uptightness, as soon as that happens there is not awareness. But we can immediately experience a sense of awareness!

Traditionally, any chaos that came up was regarded as a shout for some kind of holiness or help, blessing, or prayer. In our ordinary, everyday life, each time something unepected suddenly came up, we would say, “Goodness, Look at that,” or we might utter sacred names. That was supposed to be a reminder for awareness. But these days, we never use the situation that way. We just use swear words in the most degrading way.

From Training the Mind and Cultivating Loving-Kindness, page 86, brought to my attention through a newsletter sign up: CTR Quote of the Week.

What sacred words would you say to remind you of awareness when you are in the midst of chaos? I wonder about the denial of reality which happens when we become angry instead of curious.

I don’t think I have any words right now. OMG, maybe. Sometimes I catch myself saying OMG or all the words. So…those might be my sacred words.

I have sacred images, too. Images which bridge the gap between the unexpected and the accepted/acknowledged.

A rock I’m carrying with me. Out of focus. I’m not sure what I need to do with it yet. Athena likes it.

An image for me is the crow (also the raven and the magpie), because when I see them or hear them, I pay attention to them. I am in an unfolding moment instead of writing or reflecting or narrating a story I’m creating.

This is an example of how I attempt to remain in the body (and the unfolding moment) while writing: I notice wind. I notice sounds of Tom moving about in the car, of a small dog barking far off, of the trembling aspen, the quaking leaves, the noisy tree closest to me, though my immediate friends are the white cedar and red pine. Big, tall trees.

Living through it and recording as I go physically feels like movement. I don’t know the reader’s reaction. I don’t know how the reader might define “remaining in the body”- maybe remaining aware of the body while writing or doing anything.

Here is one way I think of being in the body: I used to dance. I stopped dancing. I now dance.

Round and round or spiral in and spiral out…we each have a pattern, don’t we? The way the cedar leaves are patterned from a great schematic. The way birch trunks are individual expressions and part of the great whole? We have patterns of growth. Mine involve movement. Mine want to experience the ground, the water, the tree, the night sky. Mine want to find the answers to big questions about ways to engage with the rest of the world. My patterns ask, even on the grumpiest days, How do I serve love?

Beauty someone else documented. I’d like to see this up close, woudn’t you?

I’m ending this dispatch 2 days after the writing began, at 1:46 on Sunday, September 17. We will be launching in Temagami tomorrow, September 18, 2023. We are in for some fair to great weather over the next several days and we are adaptable to our route and circumstance.

When we return, we’ll be meeting with five others up at Hap and Andrea Wilson’s EcoLodge at Cabin Falls. Truly something special. Gratitude for this opportunity. And I intend a reliable and robust response to the challenge of all that lay ahead.

I have been writing small pieces for months as practice for this piece, weaving together the forward moment with a brief touch from the supporting memory, an experiencing of the felt emotion, and the return to the forward moment. I think of in waves. I try to remain attentive, connected, noticing. I’m curious to know the limits of exploring the present moment, of creating with the present moment. As a warrior, it seems wise to create the conditions for sanity and love. Much gratitude for this day.

Much Love, Mar’ce